Art Lessons Big and Small

Recently several people approached me with a strange request to participate in a comic or graphic Novel and one person simply said “Shaun, do that comic!” I suppose they perceived there was a desire there or lost project in my brain somewhere or something… idk? Anyway, in looking through some old file backup I found this image… In building the new structure of all I’m doing now, and travelling everywhere doing live art, I had completely forgotten about this idea.

The last few years have taken so many twists that when I see the old image below I just shake my head with bewilderment!Shaun Hays, Chalk Champ, Artist, Author of “How To Be An Art Ninja” releases Series of Books and Instruction Videos.

*When I saved this old image, I was getting ready for “Phase1 pre-Order” to enable the creation and release of a new art lesson series to supplement my income of speaking and speed chalk art. The Lesson here: I simply wasn’t ready to commit to the full concept. Mostly out of desire to do it right the first time.

3D Chalk was helping but not yet in full swing year round. At that time, I had released a small motivational book about creating fire in your heart and stoking that fire into a life changing movement… I didn’t understand marketing and book publishing, so I self-published a couple hundred and only sold that many. I didn’t have the right connections and frankly my heart felt motivation didn’t meet up with my lack of aggressive discipline. Another worthy lesson learned.

To switch things up from Chalks and Motivational Talks, the “Art Ninja” series was to be part Comic Book and part instructional with photos and other illustrations, accompanied by a DVD or CD ROM for each book. (I always intended on drawing a better ninja but I was only in the brainstorming phase, and this was from a very quick, and loose drawing with a felt tip marker on very “bleed prone” pulp paper. #geterdun )

LOTS of great things happened soon after which took my attention away from ever moving forward on the project. I was going to include all my strengths in illustration, including chalk, pastels etc but it was going to be just a general idea of great shortcuts and building blocks for anyone wanting to be a better artist. The funny thing is, I always felt I had NO IDEA how to teach simple concepts… I felt and still feel like you should have some truly basic skills before coming to me for any instruction, or its just wasting our time because ANYONE can teach you the basics. Well, that’s simply NOT true. About 20 years ago, I taught several basics to my nephews in a booklet I made for them as a Christmas present. I also included some advanced techniques so they could advance quickly if they wanted.

Turns out, one of them did. He was only 4 at the time and is now selling artwork around the globe. He’s trained himself in a style of artwork I find incredible and done almost everything, since that first booklet, on his own! Check him out here: Shaun’s Nephew (truly a Ninja of art)

My other nephew’s and neices are all Super Cool and Ninja’s in their own categories, but that’s for another post!

Perhaps if enough interest is shown, I will get back on this “Art Ninja” project, but I cannot add it in right away. If I do, the graphics and all will be redone and the books will be full color glossy pages and each include video instructional worthy of a network broadcast. I look back and think “I want to be proud of this if it is still in circulation 40 years from now.” I have thought of doing a Crowd Funding Page, but until I have time to assess the expenses involved, I simply cannot justify setting it up.

I am interested in your thoughts – would you like to become an Art Ninja? Do you think Art is important? Would you recommend it or buy it for someone? Please comment on my FaceBook Fan Page – I’m going to post this article there too.

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Published by shaunhays

Artist, Author, Speaker, Chicago Chalk Champ, Animal Lover and Father of "a loud noise with dirt on it", in other words, a 4 yr old boy! Met my true love, Faith, in 1990 and never let go of her!
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2 thoughts on “Art Lessons Big and Small”

You might want to research the types of art books and their target markets and then see what audience you want to hit…

For instance, I’ve seen a couple fun books for kids (probably grade school) in years past. You might think of the regular school market, the online school market (which with the bathroom, lockerroom chaos is likely to grow) and of course the home school market.

For instance, Connections Online Academy (I think based out east ) contracts with a number of states who offer online schooling as an alternative to brick and mortar schools. Indiana provides free online public schooling thru them.

We have not seen any of their art courses, but an art course done for online students might be a possibility for you (Their classes run from K-12).

Years back I had an art book by Mark Kistler (forget the name). In a fun way, he taught shading, overlapping, texture,….etc. (a lot of Renaissance concepts) but in a kid friendly fun way.